ARGH! ARRRRGH! I just needed to yell a bit.
For the last week, I've been unable to figure out a problem that has been making me crazy. Last week I filled the pond up about 1" above the lower skimmer plate. Kicked on the pump and everything worked beautifully--as expected. Had to shut down as it was getting late and figured I'd contunue the next day.
The following morning I wake up bright and early and notice that the water is 1" below the skimmer plate. Hrmph! I put the hose in the pond and again fill it up to the point where the proper water line of the pond will always be. I shut things off, and the next morning, again the water line has dropped again to the very same spot. WTF! I've got a leak!!
So, I begin the process of elimination over the course of many days. I knew it wasn't the skimmer because the water would drop below the skimmer plate. I didn't think it was a hole in the liner, as it would have taken a fairly significant hole to lose that much water, but nonetheless I look carefully for holes around the liner and see nothing.
Ok, so maybe it's one of my TPR's. I drop the waterline to the top of the TPRs and do the milk test. I grab some milk in the palm of my hand and release and float it in front of each TPR to see if I notice any milky water being pulled in by the leak. Nothing.
Then I'm worried it's the bottom drains. So, I drop the water line again, below the TPR's. I make a mark on the liner and let it sit for 2 days. Nothing. The water line is completely in tact, and the bottom drains are holding water as required. Amen!
Yesterday, my friend who is helping me comes over to noodle the problem. We decide to take off the flanges on the TPR's and feel behind them through the rubber, and it's totally dry. We reset them with a PILE of P&L Roofing Sealant and sit at the pond edge to contemplate.
I tell him that the odd thing is that there was water behind one of the corner folds in the liner above one of the TPR's. Finally, he says, maybe it's how I folded the corners?! Now, I wasn't there when he did this part, when I came back out from a business call I noticed that the corners were beautifully folded and that was that.
So, I jump up and feel for the corner folds. Sure enough, the corners were never folded UP and OVER the pond edge! He made a beautiful fold and left the corners down about 12 inches below water line--EXACTLY the point that the water line kept dropping to!!!! So, when the water gets past the corner fold, which of course it naturally will, it finds it's way into the top of the fold and exits the pond from behind the block!
At the same time I was horrified, I was thrilled! After a week of sleepless nights of trying to figure out what was happening, I finally had a real answer. I had a good night's sleep last night for the first time in a while. There's nothing worse than losing water and not knowing why or where it's happening from.
So, what to do next? Well, I won't be able to do this until Tuesday, but I have to grab the sawzall and cut 4 of the corner capstones off the top of the block. I then need to reach down behind the liner and pull the ends of the fold up so they are above water line. I hope it will be that easy and then cement the capstones back on. A pain in the butt indeed, but at least I know what the problem is and how to fix it. Though I don't want to start ripping up work that's been done, it's actually good that this ended up the problem versus finding out it was something or somewhere much more difficult to get to.
Important lesson here--when your pond is being built and you are using help, do not walk away for a minute as important facets are happening.
Well, it's a delay, but at least something fixable. Doh!
